iPhone · iOS 15 and later

Recorder

Recorder is a working iPhone app that does two things properly rather than many things loosely: it records audio, it records video, and it keeps everything it captures somewhere you can find it again. The home screen is four large targets — record audio, record video, or open either library — with a running count of what is already saved.

Both recorders show you what is actually happening while they run. Elapsed time counts to the second and the file size updates as it grows, so a 4K clip climbing past four megabytes a second is visible rather than a surprise when storage runs out. Audio recording has a Mark button for flagging a point of interest without breaking the take, and video sessions number their clips.

Nothing is saved namelessly. Stopping a recording offers a timestamped name you can replace with a description. The libraries are searchable and sort by newest, oldest or longest, each row carrying its date, length and size. Playback opens in place with a scrubber, fifteen second skips, variable speed from 0.5x to 3x and trimming — and if a file has gone missing on disk, the list says so rather than quietly dropping it.

PlatformiPhone, portrait, iOS 15 and later
Video3840 x 2160 (4K), numbered clips
PlaybackTrim, 0.5x to 3x, 15 second skips
LibrarySearch, sort, multi-select, missing file detection
StatusWorking app, tested on device

What it costs

Recording is free. The microphone and the camera, for as long as you like, as many times as you like, with no purchase in the app and no limit on length, count or quality. That is the half of the app that captures the thing you cannot capture twice, and it is not going behind a payment screen.

The playback studio is what a subscription unlocks — the waveform, the scrubber, the markers and the variable speeds. Reviewing a recording closely is the part that took the work and the part you can do later, at a desk, having decided it is worth doing. Capturing it is the part that cannot wait.

Your recordings stay yours either way. They are files on your phone: share them, copy them off, or open them in anything else that plays audio and video, subscription or no subscription. Nothing you record is held hostage to a payment.

Monthly £1.99 a month
Quarterly £4.99 every three months — £1.66 a month, saving £0.98

UK prices. The App Store shows the price in your own currency before you buy, and it is the App Store that takes the payment.

Nothing you record is uploaded anywhere. The recordings never leave the phone, there is no account to make, and no analytics of any kind. The one piece of personal information the subscription involves is your email address, held so the subscription can be recognised as yours — and that is the only thing the app ever sends. See the privacy policy and the terms of use.

Every screen in the app

Ten screens, three at a time — swipe, or use the arrows and dots. Tap a screenshot to see it full size. The apps are still being developed, so screens may look different in the version you download — these shots are not always updated the moment something changes.

Opening the app Four ways in
Two recorders, two libraries, and a count of what is already saved.
Recording The recorder
Elapsed time, the file growing beside it, and a trace driven by the microphone itself.
The library Everything recorded
Length, size and date on every row, sorted whichever way suits.
The library Finding one
Search narrows the list as you type — one of four, here.
The library Your own order
Drag the rows into the order you want and it stays that way.
Playing it back The player
The waveform filled as far as you have played, speeds from 0.25x to 5x, and skip either way.
Editing Trim
Cut a recording down to the part worth keeping, exactly where you asked.
Video The video library
Poster frames, so a list of clips is a list of pictures.
Video Playing video
Plays in place above the list it came from, or full screen.
Settings Three short lists
The theme, the count-in before recording starts, and where the storage has gone.

Interested in an app like this, or in something else for iPhone, iPad or Android? Get in touch.